One ordinary mom's mission to cut out processed foods.

Are you being fooled by the imitation?

You have to wonder…if one of the main ingredients in Half & Half is cream (which is perceived as fattening) then what in the world do they use to make “fat free” Half & Half? And what about mayonnaise? A recipe for homemade mayo calls for oil and eggs – both contain fat grams. So how do they make “fat free” mayonnaise? And should we really be eating it?

I was surprised to learn that there actually used to be a food industry regulation requiring manufacturers to clearly label foods like these as an “imitation”. Of course these products were looked down upon, and so it is no surprise that the ever-so-powerful food industry hated this rule. According to Michael Pollan “in 1973 [they] finally succeeded in getting the imitation rule tossed out.” Suddenly, what was once almost considered to be fraud now in some cases appeared to be even healthier than the real thing (if you are only judging by added nutrients and reduced fats that is).

Also consider that if the low fat version of a product (that doesn’t even contain any of the original ingredients) still tastes good then there is probably a reason for that too. In some cases the fattening ingredient was just replaced with a sweetener of some sort, which holds true for both fat free half & half and fat free mayo. Do we really think those versions are “healthier” than eating the whole foods themselves that inspired those products?

So here is a little list to help you make an educated decision on whether you want to consume a chemically created imitation or the real thing!